Samsung Continues to Dominate Smartphone Market in 2012

Its that time of the year, folks. There are all kinds of nifty bits of data being released every few days that give us an increasingly clear picture of the changes in the smartphone market over the last 12 months. This is one of the broader overviews that came from Strategy Analytics recently. This study simply tracks the number of smartphones that each manufacturer shipped in 2012. I doubt any of us will be blown away by these numbers, but there are a few interesting nuggets to be pulled out of this report. But first, lets look at the raw data. As you might expect, Samsung continues to be the global leader in smartphone sales by a significant margin. Samsung shipped 77 million more devices in 2012 than its nearest competitor, Apple. That gives everyone's favorite Korean electronics giant a 30.4% market share world wide. Apple has continued to stick around in second place. However, it is worth noting that while Apple's market share grew from 19% in 2011 to 19.4% in 2012, Samsung made massive gains jumping from 19.9% to 30.4%. With the launch of the Galaxy S III and the roaring success of the Galaxy Note and the Galaxy Note II, its not surprising that Samsung is continuing to rule the smart phone market. No other manufacture has managed to ship phones at a reasonable price point while still maintaining such a high standard of quality. It is also interesting that although Apple and Samsung account for nearly  50% of the smart phone market combined, there are also many smaller manufactures that continue to grow and even show signs of thriving. Although HTC has struggled in the last several months, ZTE, Motorola and others continue to show signs of innovation and creativity. And in an increasingly competitive market filled with ever more well-informed consumers, innovation will continue to be the most valuable commodity in 2013.